Who among us does not long to go back and witness first-hand certain moments in Catholic history? Certain decisive moments.

Here are a few of mine: On the eve of the battle of Lepanto, Don John of Austria silenced his quarrelling admirals without raising his voice. “Gentlemen,” he said. “The time for counsel has passed. Now is the time for war.” Imagine the stunned—yet impressed—look on the face of the Venetian sea veteran Sebastian...

Not so long ago—certainly within my parents’ lifetime—Catholics so influenced the culture in America that Archbishop Fulton Sheen ruled the television airwaves, Flannery O’Connor, the short story, and Walker Percy, the novel. The critics at the New York Times Review of Books must have gnashed their teeth each time Percy delivered a book deeply suffused with Catholic sense, but they could deny neither the brilliance of his prose nor the penetration with which treated the...

A considerable number of Catholic youths who would never countenance the murder of an unborn child cannot see why two men (or two women) “who love each other,” as they say, should not have the right to marry. If you don’t believe me, then I’m guessing you haven’t spoken recently with a student at one of America’s diocesan high schools about something other than soccer or where he plans to go to college.

It is little wonder that so many teenagers are confused. The whole concept of a...

It is perhaps too common in our age to regard vacations as opportunities to shut down the brain and fire up the senses: Pig out, drink up, sleep in.

That may be a bit of a caricature. On the other hand, ranking among America’s top five tourist destinations is a city in the Nevada desert the economy of which profits from these and other excesses best left unmentioned.

In the wake of “Doctor” Kermit Gosnell’s conviction for the gruesome murders of helpless infants, abortion enthusiasts have scrambled to distance themselves from his house of horrors. Planned Parenthood officials issued an editorial applauding the conviction on the grounds that Gosnell violated “laws and regulations in the state of Pennsylvania.” They criticized the “unthinkable conditions” of his abortuary—pardon me, “clinic.”